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Delaware County, OH
AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2021
Project Category: Community Gardens
Description: To give older adult residents of an affordable housing complex a space to gather, SourcePoint and Age-Friendly Delaware County created an accessible community garden. Volunteers installed raised beds to enable gardeners to work without needing to kneel down. Additionally, they laid an ADA-complaint crushed gravel path, added accessible benches and erected an aluminum fence around the space. Today, St. Michael's Community Garden hosts programming for gardeners and non-gardeners alike, including healthy cooking classes. Project organizers say the garden has helped combat social isolation, and senior housing residents now grow produce in their own backyard, which helps reduce their grocery bills.
Green Bay, WI
AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2021
Project Category: Community Gardens
Description: The Farmory is a nonprofit urban farm, where community members can learn about sustainable agriculture and aquaponics. However, many of the farm's features were inaccessibly to visitors who rely on wheelchairs or other mobility devices. To make the space more accessible, the Farmory installed a new aquaponics system, which is low to the ground. This allows visitors to see the farm's growing systems without needing to climb onto a ladder. The system consists of four growing beds, water tanks, a germinating chamber and a harvesting area. Today, produce grown with the new aquaponics system also helps combat food insecurity -- the Farmory donates about ten pounds of greens each week to the county's Aging and Disability Resource Center.
Opa-locka, FL
AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2021
Project Category: Community Gardens
Description: For Opa-Locka residents, the closest supermarket is more than a mile away, making fresh produce in this low-income community hard to come by. The Opa-Locka Community Development Corporation conducted an extensive community engagement process to determine what kinds of fresh produce the community needed most. They then responded by planting 14 fruit trees -- as well as herbs -- in the common area of a multifamily residential development. The CDC also installed lighting, benches and other amenities in the space, allowing residents to gather there.
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Clarksville, TN
AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2019
Project Category: Improved wayfinding
Description: To encourage people to park their vehicles and travel on foot, the City of Clarksville installed signs near underutilized parking lots, which display directions and walking times to destinations around downtown. The hope was that knowing the time commitment for walks would give pedestrians confidence they could manage city distances comfortably. At its Shop Small Saturday event in 2020, the City set up a booth to talk with passersby about the signs. Project organizers reported shoppers were surprised to learn how short walks were from destination to destination. The signage is part of a larger effort to promote active transportation -- such as walking and biking -- in Clarksville.
Clarksville, TN
AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2020
Project Category: Supporting family caregivers
Description: Mental Health America of the Midsouth expanded its Dementia-Friendly Churches Project, which supports older adults and their caregivers by training church staff, volunteers and others about the effects of dementia and how to help those affected. Employing a multi-denominational, multi-belief system approach, MHA trained 200 individuals at 30 places of worship in Clarksville and Franklin. The organization held trainings online and recorded the sessions to make them available after the fact. They also offered congregations technical support from a certified dementia specialist.
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